The framework for new licences will be ready by end of this financial year.
Qualcomm launched its new affordable, India-designed chipset, the Snapdragon 4s Gen 2, on Tuesday. This chipset will enable mobile device makers to sell 5G smartphones operating on a standalone (SA) network for Rs 8,300 or less.
The users of 5G-enabled Apple iPhones will be able to try 5G telecom services - wherever available publicly in the country - from next week, both on standalone (Reliance Jio) and non-standalone networks (Bharti Airtel). Airtel and Jio customers who download the iOS 16 Beta software update as part of its 'Apple Beta Software Program' can try the service and send their feedback to the company. The final updated software will become available sometime in December.
Jio is in a neck and neck battle with Airtel, which added a similar number of subscribers as Jio in the 15 months from February 2017 to April 2018
Pricing is a vital part of strategy to take high speed broadband to 265 million homes
The Big Two telecom companies have accelerated their moves towards this next-gen technology, though they have chosen very different routes to getting there.
Billionaire Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries on Friday reported a 43 per cent jump in its September quarter net profit as its businesses from oil to retail fired on all cylinders, growing both sequentially and on a year-on-year basis. Net profit of Rs 13,680 crore, or Rs 20.88 per share, in July-September compared with Rs 9,567 crore, or Rs 14.84 a share, in the same period a year back, the company said in a statement. While better realisation and a sharp rise in crude oil prices benefited the old-economy business, retail saw footfalls at stores reach pre-Covid levels and per user earning from telecom business rose.
Officials of Reliance Jio Infocomm claimed to have achieved broadband speeds on their networks that are 10-12 times faster than 3G services.
The freebies are now over, but Jio will need to notch up subscriber numbers and margins to prove its sceptics wrong.
The famous Nokia 8110 comes back to life in a new avatar after 22 years!
With India rolling out 5G services, can telcos get the sizeable 350-400 million 2G customers to upgrade to 4G, or even better -- but very improbably -- straight to 5G?
The 2016 upstart, called Jio, dislodged rivals and has emerged as the nation's No. 4 carrier by offering call services free for life and data transmission at dirt cheap rates.
Having missed most of the first three industrial revolutions, India has its chance to lead the fourth industrial revolution through a convergence of its IT prowess, ultra-high-speed internet connectivity and affordable smart devices, billionaire Mukesh Ambani said on Thursday. The richest Indian, who heads the nation's most valuable company Reliance Industries, said his group's telecom and digital unit Jio was conceived to provide the key ingredients needed to lead the fourth industrial revolution.
"We are delighted to welcome Google as a strategic investor in Jio Platforms. We have signed a binding partnership and an investment agreement under which Google will invest Rs 33,737 crores for a 7.7 per cent stake in Jio Platforms," Mukesh Ambani said at the company's annual general meeting.
The market valuation of Reliance Industries, the country's most valued firm, is fast nearing the Rs 10 lakh crore mark, surpassing British energy major BP Plc.
Jio's revenue increase was phenomenal in many circles: In Haryana, the RMS gain was 13 percentage points; in Bihar, 20 percentage points; in Odisha, 15 percentage points; and in Assam, 11 percentage points. However, incumbent telcos said this increase was only in three quarters, and it happened because of an order by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, which tweaked the definition of significant market player (SMP) for predatory pricing.
Company has plans to launch its latest 4G enabled phone Lumia 830 priced at around Rs 26,000 before taxes by Oct.
Launched in March, it triggers re-verification of suspected fraudulent numbers. Failing re-verification, the number will be disconnected.
The fixed line broadband will offer "ultra high-definition entertainment on large screen TVs, multi-party video conferencing from your living room, voice-activated virtual assistants, virtual reality gaming, digital shopping, immersive experiences," Ambani said.
Reliance reported record pre-tax profit from its retail and telecom businesses. The two now account for nearly 32 per cent of EBITDA, up from close to 25 per cent previously.
Strategic direction post-COVID-19 and further details on asset monetisation are key expectations from the 43rd AGM of RIL, analysts said.
Billionaire Gautam Adani's group is said to be planning a surprise entry into the race to acquire telecom spectrum, which will pitch it directly against Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Jio and telecom czar Sunil Bharti Mittal's Airtel, sources said. Applications for participating in the July 26 auction of airwaves, including those capable of providing fifth-generation or 5G telecom services such as ultra-high-speed internet connectivity, closed on Friday with at least four applications. Jio, Airtel and Vodafone Idea -- the three private players in the telecom sector -- applied, three sources with knowledge of the matter said.
The oil-to-telecom conglomerate reported an 8.8 per cent rise in its consolidated net profit to Rs 10,251 crore, or Rs 17.3 per share, in the third quarter ended December 31, 2018.
Billionaire Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries Ltd's plans for investing Rs 75,000 crore in solar, batteries, fuel cells and hydrogen could create valuation of $36 billion (Rs 2.6 lakh crore) for the new energy business, Wall Street brokerage Bernstein Research said in a report. Reliance currently has three verticals -- oil-to-chemical (O2C) business that houses its oil refineries, petrochemical plants and fuel retailing business; digital services that comprises telecom arm Jio; and retail including e-commerce. New Energy will be the fourth vertical. At the company's annual general meeting of shareholders last month, Ambani announced a plan to invest Rs 75,000 crore in a new energy business over the next 3 years in the next stage in its transformation.
Falling revenues, increased capex, and first full year of spectrum debt may make things worse
The highest number of requests are in Karnataka (39.18 million) and Tamil Nadu (35.56 million).
The country's two top telcos, Reliance Jio and Airtel, are working overnight to undertake one of the fastest global roll-outs of 5G services in any country just a month down the line. India might be late in the game (already 70 countries have some kind of 5G and there are 698 million 5G subscribers across the world), but it's moving at breakneck speed. In his speech at the Reliance Industries AGM, Mukesh Ambani unveiled his plan to roll out the fastest 5G network in the world, starting from four metros in October but hitting every town taluka and tehsil - there are some 5,600 of them - in the country in 18 months.
Profit from its retail business jumped 77 per cent to Rs 1,923 crore and that from telecom rose by 78.3 per cent to Rs 2,665 crore.
Airtel on Wednesday said its customers can enjoy free unlimited incoming calls on international roaming while travelling to popular destinations like the US, Canada, the UK and Singapore.
Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel have enough capacity to absorb over 113.9 million Vodafone Idea subscribers who are on 4G if Vodafone Idea has to shut operations.
The telecom companies have billed the subscribers for the period of communication blockade which began on August 5 when the Centre abrogated provisions of Article 370 and split Jammu and Kashmir into two union territories.
The Department of Telecom on Tuesday approved applications of telecom companies -- Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea and MTNL -- for conducting 5G trials but none of them will be using technologies of Chinese entities. The list of telecom gear makers approved for trials include Ericsson, Nokia, Samsung, C-DOT and Reliance Jio's indigenously developed technologies.
Incoming charges while roaming have been a hindrance to worry-free usage
The big advantage that Jio is able to garner currently is its low cost of operations.
The fall represented the second straight month of decline in subscribers. Users in the segment had reduced by 3.66 million in September, shrinking for the first time in seven months.
As many as 2,000 chips are annually designed in India by semi-conductor and fabless companies, Intel India managing director Prakash Mallya said in a conversation with Business Standard. Mallya was reiterating the importance of India in the semi-conductor sweepstakes. "As much as 90 per cent of the semi-conductor companies have a design footprint in India.
Numbers could be classified further into (140) marketing and (160 or 161) for service calls to easily identify the purpose of the call in the future.
Reliance Jio has accused old operators, including Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea, of "illegally" masquerading wire-line numbers as mobile numbers for "undue enrichment".
The market could see a fresh round of tariff war, similar to what happened in the voice market a few years ago.
The problem is simple: None of the incumbent players, including Vodafone Idea, has a similar offer to challenge Jio and ensure that its 2G customers do not migrate.
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